A demonstrator raises his fist as police stand in formation as a store burns, Monday, April 27, 2015, during unrest following the funeral of Freddie Gray in Baltimore. Gray died from spinal injuries about a week after he was arrested and transported in a Baltimore Police Department van. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

Twenty-three years after riots engulfed Los Angeles in the wake of the acquittal of four white police officers who beat Rodney King, the city is much better prepared to deal with civic unrest, Sheriff Jim McDonnell said Tuesday.

Los Angeles is in an “enviable place,” McDonnell said, having strengthened community relations, implemented reforms and enhanced training for its law enforcement officers.

“We have relationships with the community today that we couldn’t have anticipated in 1992,” the sheriff said. “There was significant training with crowd control and crowd management, but also with tactics and in dealing with crowds and making an effort to be able to meet with leaders in any incident and to have open lines of communication and to diffuse any violent situations before they become violent.”

Los Angeles remained on alert Tuesday afternoon, as East Coast police and the National Guard sought to restore order in Baltimore, where looting and rioting broke out Monday, after the funeral of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died April 19 from injuries suffered while in police custody.

McDonnell and faith leaders responded proactively on Monday evening with a news conference to get ahead of any civil disobedience that might have occurred in Los Angeles.

The Los Angeles Police Department went on alert based on threats against law enforcement officers emanating from the unrest in Baltimore.

About 50 people protested near the LAPD’s 77th Division on Monday. Six were arrested on charges of failing to follow orders to disperse and resisting arrest after officers ended the protest when it moved onto the street, an LAPD spokeswoman said.

L.A. City Fire Capt. Daniel Curry said the Fire Department is not in any advanced deployment, but is in contact with the LAPD. He said the fire chief would decide if firefighters would respond to a situation where protesters were throwing bottles, for example, as a precaution if it appeared violence may escalate.

Curry said the firefighters have additional protective gear when responding to any potential violence.

In Baltimore, police said at least 20 officers were injured, more than 200 adults and 34 minors were arrested and nearly 150 cars were burned during the rioting that began on Monday. More than 2,000 National Guardsmen and 1,000 law enforcement officers had been deployed in the city on Tuesday to prevent further unrest.

During the Los Angeles Riots in 1992, 53 died and more than 2,000 were injured in six days of rioting.

McDonnell noted that Los Angeles is in a different place since 1992, when violent crime and gang activity were at a high. Violent crime trends have been at a 50-year low, he said.

If violence were to erupt in Los Angeles, law enforcement would activate different levels of response.

The Clinton Crime Bill in 1994 that funded 100,000 police officers nationwide spurred efforts to improve relations between police and the public by making more community-oriented police possible, McDonnell said. The 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York City hampered some of those community-based efforts as police moved to counterterrorism response and intelligence-oriented policing.

“We’re trying to find that balance,” he said.

L.A. City Councilman Bernard Parks, who had a 38-year career in the LAPD and was chief from 1997 to 2002, said he believes the city is very well prepared to handle incidents of civil disobedience.

“You train. You hope for the best. You prepare people and prepare your resources understanding that the training is perishable,” Parks said. “You hope the people who arrive at that location are prepared and can keep things under control and they are using the resources that are available and they are allowed to do their jobs.”

He said although improvements have been made in the relationships between police and the community, he wouldn’t say something like 1992 couldn’t happen again.

“I don’t think by any stretch of the imagination many of the conflicts, the historical misalignments in the community, have been solved,” Parks said.

Sarah Favot is an award-winning Los Angeles-based freelance writer. Most recently she was a data and investigative reporter at L.A. School Report, a non-profit education news website. Prior to that she was a staff writer for the L.A. Daily News covering county government. She is Vice President of the Los Angeles Chapter of The Society of Professional Journalists.